Chapter 13- Interpreting Questions

List five areas you will attend to as you work with educational staff to create a learning environment that is conducive to interpreting.

1. Location of the Interpreter:
I think that it will be important for the interpreters to let the teachers know where the best place is for the interpreter. The interpreter should be somewhere that easy to be seen by the deaf student. It is also important for the interpreter to not be in the way of the board or slide show, where the deaf student could read it if necessary. It is important for the interpreter and teacher to communicate where the best placement would be.  

2. Having students raise their hands to answer. 
This would help the interpreter to better point out who was talking and better facilitate communication. Interpreters need a little bit of lag time. This is  from the time that something is spoken to the time the interpreter produces it in ASL. By having rapid fire question and answer, this does not give the interpreter adequate time to translate the information correctly. This, in turn, does not usually give the deaf student a chance to answer the questions. This could lead to a feeling of isolation. 

3. Having materials accessible. 
This means that the teacher and interpreter should work together to find movies and films that would have Closed Captioning. Closed captioning is on almost every film, however if it is not provided, it could be captioned by someone. If the teacher lets the interpreter know in advance that a film needs to be captioned, the interpreter could find the resources needed to caption it. 

4. Allowing the Interpreter access to materials. 
By allowing the interpreter to have access to lesson plans or readings that the teacher will be having in class, it helps the interpreter to better be prepared. It is much easier and provides a better interpretation if the interpreter knows beforehand what the lesson will be about. Going in to the lesson not knowing will be difficult. Interpreters often have to research the topics they will be discussing to learn possible signs they will have to know, and to obtain a grasp of the concepts they will be interpreting. 

5. Knowing the interpreters are certified. 
When the interpreter is not interpreting adequately enough for the student, it can severely delay that child in his or her language and knowledge. The administrators should check to see if the interpreter is certified and registered. There have been many stories of people not being capable of providing adequate interpreting, and the student taking the fall for it. It is not enough to just know Sign Language, these interpreters have to be able to match the child's needs, and be able to bridge the communication gap. I found this website pretty interesting because it tells what the role of the interpreter is, and the registrations and certifications they should have. 
http://www.classroominterpreting.org/eipa/index.asp

Motivation

I believe that it all depends on the student, and how they need to be motivated. Some children are very self motivated and want to do well in school because they genuinely want to learn and do well. Others will need more extrinsic motivation. I feel like as educators, one of the main goals would be to have the child gain intrinsic motivation, because that is how people truly learn. Sometimes with more extrinsic motivators, the child will do the work, only to get it done and get the reward, whereas of a child completes the task because he/she wants to do a good job, they will truly learn from it. As children though, we have to be taught how to be more intrinsically motivated. Some of the theories that I thought really helped me as a child was verbal praise, and competition. I always really enjoyed hearing praise from my teacher when I had done well. I also think that competition really helped as well. I feel like physical rewards, such as stickers or candy, worked best when I was younger, however when I was middle school and high school, I really enjoyed of a teacher gave the class a competitive game to play, instead of just a study guide. With these different extrinsic motivators, I think that teachers can help students to gain  intrinsic motivation.

M. McMahan PLE 1

This class seems very interesting. As an interpreting major, I am excited to see more of the teachers' perspectives. Through this course I hope to learn more about how to deal with some difficulties that might arise in the classroom. I think taking this class, and learning more about the teaching methods, will help in interpreting as well. If I can better understand the methods and ways educators will be teaching, I can better interpret for the teacher and student. When coming into the class, I thought I would not be learning anything, because the class was mostly for teachers, but after thinking about it, and knowing the topics we will be talking about I believe this will be very beneficial. I would like to know more about how the education majors in the class think they will be organizing their classroom. By understanding how they will be conducting the classes, I feel like it will help me to better interpret and help the student to better understand.